I've been looking at the new Policy-Based Management (was: Declarative Management Framework) in SQL Server BOL. All of the BOL examples use the SSMS user-interface to define and maintain the policy store. While there will likely be 3 ways to configure PBM as there is with, say, replication (SSMS, SMO, and system stored procs), I thought I'd take a try at programming it using the new SMO libraries.

Because the docs are sparse (there are listing of the new classes but no description of what they do in BOL), I figured I'd start by writing C# code, because I like the visualizers (those components that allow you to drill into a heavily nested structures while debugging) in Visual Studio. Later on, I'll port these to PowerShell. I can also use PowerShell reflection capabilities and the new SQL Server provider to get a quick look a the structures.

Be aware of the fact that, since this API is so sparsely documented it could change by RTM. Always a consideration.

The new classes live, for the most part, in two libraries:
Microsoft.SqlServer.Dmf
Microsoft.SqlServer.Management.Sdk.Sfc

I also added references in the project to:
Microsoft.SqlServer.ConnectionInfo
Microsoft.SqlServer.PolicyEnum
Microsoft.SqlServer.Smo

I mean to start by replicating the two examples in the PBM (is that its new acronym?) books online tutorial. But first, we need a starting point. It's the PolicyStore class. The PolicyStore is also the machine-root of the PowerShell provider drive SQLSERVER:SQLPolicy\{machine}\{instance}.

You can initialize the PolicyStore's connection with an instance of SqlStoreConnection from the …Management.Sdk.Sfc namespace. Not sure what Sfc stands for, but being an old C++ programmer, perhaps its SQL Foundation Classes 😉 ? No matter. Luckily you can initialize a SqlStoreConnection with a plain old SqlConnection. So, lets connect to the store.

Where to go from here? In the PowerShell provider, the subdirectories of the policy store are Conditions, Policies, ObjectSets, PolicyCategories, and PolicyCategorySubscriptions. To create the first policy (MailOffByDefault) we need a Condition and a Policy. That's next.